"The plot was hatched in a barroom, a liquor seller hired a Marlboro, Mass., bartender to do the 'job,' and he was the guest of hotel keepers while he was spying out the land preparatory to his murderous assault. Never was a more cool, calculating and infamous deed wrought in this country. The wretch, Chatelle, acted under a sudden impulse to gratify an abnormal passion, but these wretches planned weeks ahead to 'do up' Smith, yet such cowards were they, they dared not strike the blow, but hired the Marlboro tool to do it for them. Jenne, Howarth and Wilson, you are arrant cowards, and your weakness is only exceeded by the devilishness of your malice! "These are the men who say we cannot enforce prohibition, and undertake to make the law a dead letter. Men who will murder--no, they lack that courage, but will hire the slugger--if they are not permitted to carry out their work of death. Shall we make our laws to please, or to restrain and punish such men? "Not the least ignominious feature of the trial was the failure of the jury to convict upon the clearest evidence. Their disagreement was rebuked by Judge Lynch, and later by the prisoners themselves pleading guilty. The murderous assault and the terrorizing of the jury furnish all the evidence that is requisite to justify the demand for prohibition." The _Witness_ of March 16th contained the following, giving the opinions of certain local papers respecting the decisions of the court in this trial: "The Huntingdon _Gleaner_, referring to the sentence of a month's imprisonment passed on the defendants in the Smith assault case, says: 'This is a most inadequate punishment. Had Kelly put more force into the first blow he struck with his piece of lead pipe, Smith would assuredly have been killed. The liquor men, who were the authors of the foul deed, should have been sent to the penitentiary.' "Referring to the disgraceful conduct of the jurors in disagreeing, despite Kelly's confession, the Waterloo _Advertiser_ says: 'The jury might, at least, have brought in the verdict of a Western jury that tried a man for assault with intent to kill. After being out two minutes the jury filed into court, and the foreman said: "May it please the court, we, the jury, find that the prisoner is not guilty of hitting with intent to kill, but simply to paralyze, and he done it." The trial has been an expensive one to the Crown, and its inglorious ending will hardly satisfy the public that the ends of justice have been served and the law vindicated.'" The following appeared as an editorial in the _Witness_ of March 27th: